Much
of the establishment press has been especially critical of Michael Moore. In
the past few days, it has questioned every word he has said, every line in
his third documentary, “Fahrenheit 9/11.” The film attacks President George
W. Bush, the Bush Administration, corporate America, and the media. It has
been called propaganda and manipulative; Moore has been called obnoxious,
arrogant, and detestable.

“Today Show” co-anchors
Katie Couric and Matt Lauer who, like most of the infotainment TV industry
are usually deferential and gushing to innumerable celebrities and
politicians, were especially caustic in their interviews and statements
about Moore and his film. Perhaps that’s because Moore’s scathing film
includes images of a gushy Couric. Jonathan Foreman, the New York Post’s
film critic, wrote that the film “is intended to look like and feel like
journalism, except it would never be acceptable if you tried to publish it
because it’s full of lies and half-truths.” Apparently, Mr. Foreman believes
everything in the Post and the other 1,650 daily newspapers is completely
accurate, that not only are the facts they present completely accurate but
no relevant fact is deliberately left out.

“Fahrenheit 9/11” has a few
factual discrepancies, for which the mainstream media have excoriated Moore,
as if a couple of misinterpretations would denigrate the entire film. But,
Moore also presents hundreds of undisputable facts and, ultimately, the
“truth,” something most of the establishment media have been slow to publish
or air.

In one of the scenes, he
shows the President projecting a concerned look, telling the nation, “I call
upon all nations to stop these terrorist killings,” then when he has
delivered his “presidential sound bite” he picks up a golf club and tells
the press, “Now watch this drive.” Was Moore the only one to have that
footage? Or were the 50 or more reporters who “body watch” the President too
much the sycophants to see the hypocrisy. Why didn’t we see it before? Were
the reporters more concerned about not getting choice seats on the
presidential press plane to raise objections to his handling of critical
issues?

The media constantly whine
how hard it is to get news from the Bush Administration; apparently, they
are “forced” to attend daily press briefings at the White House and the
Department of Defense to get any kind of news. Somewhere between when the
nation’s journalists took News writing in their sophomore year and when they
got the choice Washington assignments they forgot a basic lesson—it’s
perfectly acceptable journalism to dig out the stories and not rely upon
being hand-fed by corporate, governmental, and political “spokesmen.”

Matt Lauer and other
millionaire TV journalists—the ones who interview every movie star shortly
after their movies open—suddenly became “investigative” reporters and
demanded to know if Moore wasn’t hyping the movie to make even more money
from it, as if their own billion dollar conglomerates were pristine citadels
of charity.

Among the questions Lauer
and others asked Moore was how he got footage in Iraq. They were suspicious.
The “embedded” press from the “big-name” networks and media outlets had
“official” credentials to travel with the troops, and to listen to the
generals and public affairs officers. The alternative press and hundreds of
smaller publications, even if they had brilliant reporters with knowledge of
the Middle East and the American military, were not embedded and, thus, were
treated as yapping pests by the “larger,” more self-righteously important
media. So, they figured unless Moore did something unethical, it was
inconceivable that he actually got footage that the mainstream media
didn’t—or couldn’t—or wouldn’t—get.

The New York Times, about
two years late, admitted it was probably too deferential to the Bush
Administration and didn’t challenge the President’s reasons why he believed
he had to lead the nation into a war in Iraq. Hundreds of newspapers,
magazines, radio and TV stations, most probably believing they were being
patriotic by supporting the President’s political agenda in the “War on
Terror,” blindly accepted what they were told, seldom questioning now-proven
lies and half-truths.

Walter Cronkite, who helped
establish the now-dated concept that TV news should be—well, news—believes
it is unpatriotic not to question the government. Other may agree with him,
but they don’t practice it. Few questioned the President or his cabinet and
advisors as rigorously as they did Moore. The opening weekend’s box office
take for “Fahrenheit 9/11” should, at the very least, show journalists that
the public not only wants, but demands, another view, something they don’t
get from the lap-dog press that drools over daily news briefings as if they
were Texas-sized steaks.

If it shows nothing else,
“Fahrenheit 9/11”shows one thing—the American media have abrogated their
responsibility to be this nation’s “watch-dog.” Had they properly done their
job the past few years and not been detracted by every tawdry sex scandal
they could dig up, “Fahrenheit 911” would not have been necessary—it would
have been “old news.”

Walter Brasch, an award-winning journalist for more than 30
years, is professor of mass communications at Bloomsburg University. Rosemary Brasch is a family services
specialist for national disasters for the Red Cross and a worker rights
advocate. You may contact them at
brasch@bloomu.edu.